Prairie Farmers Still Wrestling with Drought

Monday, September 22, 2025

Some Areas Entering Their Ninth Consecutive Dry Year

By Matt Jones

Drought has been a consistent issue for many Prairie farmers for the majority of the past decade. While the exact conditions can vary significantly from community to community, the fact is that dry years have become a common occurrence.

Looking at a few recent examples, the rural municipality of Big Stick in southwestern Saskatchewan was among several that have declared a state of emergency due to extreme drought. Big Stick farmer Tyson Jacksteit told CTV News recently that his field should be filled with lentil plants that measure in feet, but the sparse plants in his field only measure in inches this year.

“It’s very troublesome to see a crop like this,” said Jacksteit. “What makes it worse is we’ve had this kind of crop for nine years now.”

The Canadian Drought Monitor (CDM) service shows that the Prairies experienced less than a quarter of their normal amount of rainfall in the region in the past year. At a glance, the CDM’s map for June 2025 shows the impacts varying wildly. Each Prairie province has conditions that range from ‘abnormally dry’ to ‘extreme drought,’ with ‘moderate drought’ being the most prevalent in the region. Going back a decade, the June 2015 map shows a similar range of conditions, but with the lesser ‘abnormally dry’ being the most prevalent. However, these numbers are difficult to fairly compare due to both weather fluctuations and differences in where drought was analyzed – in June 2015, much of Manitoba was not analyzed, while in June 2025, much of the area between Calgary, Edmonton and Saskatoon was not analyzed.

Aaron Stein, executive director of the Alberta Federation of Agriculture (AFA), says that has been the experience of his members – the intensity of the impacts varies significantly from area to area and farmer to farmer. But the impacts are real.

“I’ve heard yields are very, very low in the northeast and northwest regions when it comes to hay,” says Stein. “I know there are some discussions around livestock, and there may not be enough feed, so there may be some insurance claims for that.”

Stein, a member of the province’s Drought and Excessive Moisture Advisory Group, says that factors such as how many heat units are experienced, the saturation and the moisture-holding capacity of the soil, all play into how the drought impacts vary from area to area.

“We’ve seen Alberta Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation RJ Sigurdson have some very forward-thinking and good investments in irrigation strategy and technology, and expanding our irrigation, and that’s great,” says Stein. “If you’re in an irrigation district, you’re sitting pretty well compared to those that are in dry land and those in more remote areas.”

Stein says that from members of the AFA that he has heard from, it is common for farmers to buy supplemental feed and additional hay for the winters if they are unable to grow enough silage of their own for their livestock. He has also seen business risk management plans and farm risk management plans becoming much more common – and some lending groups will actually require that a potential lendee has such plans in place.

Another unique factor in this topic is the prevalence of related issues – for example, gophers. Stein notes that the gopher population has exploded in more drought-stricken areas.

Gophers are hardly a new challenge for Prairie farmers – there are records of gopher bounties and holidays focused on gopher hunting going back over 100 years in the area – but the problem has been exacerbated by drought conditions and reduced populations of gopher predators.

“We’re just about to come up with a piece here and a press release on how Alberta agriculture is being affected by gophers in drought-stricken regions,” says Stein. “Some producers are losing 500 to 700 acres of great arable land because of drought and the inability to control some of the gophers.”

Stein notes that the Alberta government have made available a Farming in Dry Conditions page on their website, which provides a variety of updates, reports, maps and other resources for farmers affected by drought or near-drought conditions. The page can be found at www.alberta.ca/farming- in-dry-conditions.

One of Stein’s Manitoban counterparts – Jill Verwey, president of Keystone Agricultural Producers – notes that 2021 was their most difficult year in terms of specific drought impacts. Crops, cereal, oil seeds, pulse crops and livestock were all negatively impacted by droughts.

“Because there was a shortage of feed grains, that definitely affected the price of feed,” says Verwey. “So you had a lack of feed available, and for the feed that was available, the price was substantially higher.”

Asked about how farmers have mitigated their drought impacts, Verwey notes that many have minimized the amount of tillage they have conducted prior to putting in crops. There is also irrigation equipment available that ensures a producer gets the best use out of the water they do have, though it can be cost-prohibitive.

“I think farmers will use every technique that is available to them financially to ensure that they get the best crops that they can and, in a lot of cases, to be the best stewards of their land that they can be as long as it’s economically feasible,” says Verwey.

Stein adds that one of the AFA’s board members has also undertaken efforts such as utilizing minimal tilling and diversifying their crop rotation, which they identified as the most effective technique in their experience.

“This year, all his crops planted on oat stubble from last year (heavy residue) are really thriving,” says Stein. “That has helped conserve a ton of the little moisture they’ve received so far this year.”

The board member has also embraced technologies and techniques such as a variable rate for seeding and modifying fertilization rates to maximize production in the more productive land, while managing expectations in the poorer land.

“Even on dry years he is seeing a benefit in this,” says Stein. “NDVI (normalized difference vegetation index) imaging through the season to make better top dressing or fungicide decisions on the more productive land has also been a benefit.”

Stein also notes that many producers are installing more snow fences to capture moisture in the winter where arid and windy conditions exist. Sequestering moisture through the seasons helps producers maximize their production in drier seasons.

But are those techniques sufficient to mitigate drought impacts? Verwey points to the importance of public and private investment into research and innovation for drought-related techniques, as well as funding support for impacted producers.

“In the case of disasters that happen quite often, if we don’t have the tools available, then we’re trying to create something, and so the timeliness of producers actually getting the money is pushed way, way back, and they aren’t getting the money when they necessarily need it,” says Verwey.

“Maybe we don’t use those every year, but it’s turnkey. You can turn it on when something happens.”

Shawna Mathieson, executive director of the Prairie Oat Growers Association (POGA), adds that in addition to techniques such as no or limited tilling, some of POGA’s members have swapped crops that are more drought-susceptible for more drought-resilient varieties, such as new varieties of oats that have arrived in recent years.

“But because farmers don’t have that crystal ball, most don’t actually change their rotation much,” says Mathieson. “Frankly, a drought can change literally overnight or within a few hours if you get a lot of rain. So more people are going to no-till or at least minimum-till to conserve whatever moisture they have.”

Everett Gibson, farm manager of Manitoba fruit producer Gibson Farm, says that the farm was established in 2018, and since then has attempted to mitigate drought (and near-drought) impacts through installing an irrigation system and covering new plantings with wood chips or mulch to keep soil cooler.

But the irrigation system doesn’t completely mitigate drought impacts – it just helps.

“The first year we got it, it was a pretty normal rain year,” says Gibson. “But the next three years were very dry. We had such little rain that we had grasshoppers everywhere, the grass was all brown, and it was just a fight to get the irrigation fixed up so we could keep our Saskatoons alive at that time.”

Even beyond drought, however, Stein notes that this is one of the most trying and challenging times in memory for Canadian farmers. Between drought and other extreme weather events, both internal and international political impacts, and rising costs, farmers are operating at a distinct disadvantage currently.

“So, although they’re a resilient group, we really need to show our appreciation for just how many challenges they’re affected by and we need to thank them for what they do,” says Stein. BF